Why are only queer rights on the chopping block?
| June 16th, 2005Over on Family Scholar’s Blog, Elizabeth writes:
If the state says marriage is just between two people that’s a fundamentally different understanding of marriage, one that affirms loud and clear that children do not necessarily need their mother and father. […] then the idea that children need their mother and father becomes not something supported and affirmed by the state, but instead a marginalized idea, declared off-sides from secular debate. The result? More children growing up without their own mother and father, and exposed to the risks and losses that come with it.
The truth is, our society regularly and routinely accepts that not every child needs their own mother and father. Divorce is legal even for parents with young children. Single parenthood is legal; no law forces heterosexual parents to marry, and no law forces parents to live with or even know their child, so long as its physical needs are provided for. There used to be laws and traditions punishing single mothers and their bastard children, but I assume you’re not wanting those punitive measures reinstated. Sperm donation is legal, and so is egg donation (Elizabeth may want these procedures banned). There is absolutely no legal barrier preventing capable parents from giving up their kids for adoption, if the parents want to.
In short, under our current system, there is barely any legal practice implying that “children do not necessarily need their [biological] mother and father” that is not legal and acceptable - except, of course, for same-sex marriage. Why is it acceptable to single out same-sex couples and punish them, and them only, in order to send a pro-mom-and-dad message?
No matter how you sugar-coat it, your arguments imply that it’s acceptable to consider same-sex couples and their children tools used to benefit heterosexuals. The idea that the well-being and legal equalities of queers and their children are worth supporting in their own right - rather than just garbage to be thrown away whenever, in some dubious and unproven theory, denying them equality assists heterosexual families - is completely absent from your arguments.
Children of same-sex couples are not tools used to benefit heterosexual families.
Lesbians are not tools to be used to benefit heterosexual families.
Gays are not tools to be used to benefit heterosexual families.
How many times do we have to repeat this before SSM opponents get the message? Get it so completely so that they don’t just agree in words, but so that they stop making arguments based on the unspoken premise that any amount of harm to queers and their families, however extreme, is justified by the prevention of any theoretical harm to a heterosexual, however small?
If the state says marriage is just between two people that’s a fundamentally different understanding of marriage, one that affirms loud and clear that children do not necessarily need their mother and father.
I’m skeptical of the “hey, kids, let’s send a message!” approach to lawmaking. The idea that equality matters so little that it should be circular-filed so that Elizabeth and her allies can send a pro-mom-and-dad telegram is not persuasive to me.
But let’s accept for a moment that laws send a message. What message is sent by keeping marriage cross-sex only? Refusing to allow same-sex marriages “affirms loud and clear” that heterosexuals are superior to homosexuals as human beings, and that the children raised by same-sex couples are bastards, low things who deserve lesser rights and lesser protections. What effect will that message have on children raised in same-sex households? (Judging by what they write, when Elizabeth and her allies say “think about the best interests of children,” they are refering only to children raised by heterosexuals).
Elizabeth, I don’t oppose your goal of seeing more children raised by their own mom and dad. I don’t have any emotional attachment to that model, but I think social science indicates that for most children it’s probably the best way to be raised (assuming that the parents are loving, that there’s no abuse, etc). But there are so many ways to support and encourage mom-dad families that don’t involve making common cause with the worse, most hateful homophobes in the nation, and attacking the civil rights of a group of people who have already been under attack for decades and decades.
The fact that divorce rates nationwide have gone down even as homosexuals have reached a level of acceptance never before seen in the USA, is clear evidence that the goal of equality and the goals of the marriage movement do not have to be in opposition.
You wouldn’t support bringing back the traditional marriage in which husbands are the owners and controllers of all their wives’s property - even though such a change might lower the divorce rate, and thus raise the odds of children raised by mom and dad. You wouldn’t support benning cross-racial or cross-religion marriage - even though such laws might reduce the divorce rate and thus raise the odds of children raised by mom and dads.
Why is it that only same-sex parents’ rights are disposable in this battle of yours? When are you going to put your own rights on the chopping block, rather than demanding that families that already have so much less privilege than your own be the ones sacrificed to benefit families that look like your own?
…that affirms loud and clear that children do not necessarily need their mother and father.
And that should be affirmed loud and clear, because it is the truth. Children do not necessarily need their own mothers and fathers.
The vast majority of individual children do need their moms and dads, of course; and I’m happy to support non-bigoted policies to encourage and support such households.
But some children get along just fine with a mom and a mom, or a dad and a dad. There are plenty of well-adjusted children of same-sex couples who are no more neurotic or suffering from angst than the rest of us are, and you constantly try to make them invisible in your approach to discussing these issues. What’s best for “most” is not what’s best for “all.” Why is admitting that not all households are, or should be, identical so threatening to you?
June 16th, 2005 at 10:56 pm
How many times do we have to repeat this before SSM opponents get the message?
They already have the message. I’m going to assume Elizabeth is not stupid. Therefore she is able to grasp that children are not crippled by having same-sex parents, and that the law in fact is about two people who want to marry, and has severed married from the necessity of childbearing. It’s not really about making sure every child has their biological parents married and present; if it were, she would be pushing to roll back the marriage clock.
Since she is not stupid and is able to grasp that her arguments fall flat, given the current state of marriage, I would have to assume she is dishonest. The fear is not that children will be miserable. It’s that gender roles are crucial to child development, and that queers can’t be any sort of decent parent to a child.
I wish she’d drop the pretentious crap and admit she’s a homophobe.
This comment was written by mythago.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 12:26 am
What’s best for “most”? is not what’s best for “all.”?
What if the former goal is achievable, or at least feasible - while the latter is not?
Consider - there is a population of Americans out there -I’d number them around 20 million - who are fundamentalist Christians so devout that some of them have already cut themselves off from contact with the larger culture. Many more of them find the idea tempting. There’s a “penumbral” group around these folks; people who aren’t part of this very orthodox group but who respect and pay attention to what it does. (I’m personally somewhere on the outer fringe of that group.) Who knows how many are in that group; they don’t have a newsletter. Call them the Really Serious Christians. Or fundelicals or Republitoids or whatever the buzzword is today. Around them is a larger group, not really committed but sometimes influenced by the Evil Secular Elite ™, sometimes by us good guys.
(Yeah, this is Manichean in its oversimplicity, to say the least; but it’s Amp’s bandwidth bill, and I hear his income from running Mexican heroin has dried up. I gotta leave a lot of stuff out. If you have to, just imagine that every lacunae in my argument is replaced with me spewing angry denunciations of puppies.)
There are a lot of social policies that this somewhat substantial, though by no means majoritarian, bloc of the citizenry simply will not accept.
So on a “social balancesheet”, the kinds of laws you would like to see governing family law, same sex marriage, adoption, etc. would be perceived by that group as detrimental to their happiness, just as it would be perceived by you and your lot as beneficial to your happiness. (I recall attending the celebration of some mutual friends at Oberlin for their joining ceremony; being accepted by their peers gave them great joy, and acceptance by the larger society would give them greater joy still; hard currency in the world of utility.)
The laws and shifts in cultural expectations you want would bring joy to a small but not insignificant minority, and pain to another small but not insignificant minority. That you don’t consider the grounds for their pain to be important doesn’t change its existence. After all, as your sides’ general rhetoric states, we fundie zealots don’t care about how you feel - and your pain is certainly real.
In addition to the purely subjective emotional pains, your side has material considerations that speak to its cause. People are denied the right to live as they wish, they cannot get hospital rights, there are legal impediments, issues involving children are basically nightmarish, and so on. This is all extremely real and the amount of pain and violation incurred is substantial, very substantial.
The viewpoint of the fundamentalists also puts a claim on real dislocation and conflict. The day after Amp rubs the lantern and gets a wish and suddenly the legal and social framework in America changes radically, a big chunk of the populace starts buying cabins and subscribing to windpower magazines. You may not think this likely; neither did Pharoah. And of course there are a lot of less-drastic actions that people who feel alienated and betrayed by their culture will take. (Peaceful actions.) The ramifications of that kind of disruption would be of similar magnitude to those encountered by gays and other non-traditional family organizations now.
So, we have a bit of a conundrum here. There are two groups of people, and there really isn’t any way for their interests to both be satisfied. Most of the issues are too basic to be compromised; they go to worldviews and eschatological beliefs, not quarrels over which field belongs to which peasant. Further, the magnitudes and vectors of their various claims on society are broadly similar, from my admittedly biased perspective. There are a lot of eggs in this omelette, no matter who gets broken or why.
Federalism, real, actual breathing federalism, the kind where Iowa and New Jersey are like alien planets, seems to me to be the only real solution. Federalism is, of course, a “best for most” situation. It still sucks to be a pierced trisexual in Larrysville, pop. 1347. Gay polyspouses from Idaho might come in for a shock in the real South Park. But as time is allowed to work its automatic redistributive magic, and as strong federalism makes it worthwhile to actually move, the numerical magnitude of “most” would start to get a lot better.
I don’t know how to get there. There is almost no effective communication between the two polar camps, and no communication means no cooperation.
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 12:43 am
There’s a second part to this issue, and that is the fact that marriage is not solely about children. The arguments made above would be better suited to supporting a ban on gays becming foster and adoptive parents–that IS truly a parent-child issue. Marriage, however, is also (and to many people, first and foremost) a couple issue. I’ve never heard anyone suggest that childless couples should be banned from marrying, or that infertile people should be required by law to adopt or have their marriage declared invalid. And if marriage were truly only about children, then what are such protections as hospital visitation rights tied to marriage for? (Now who’s redefining marriage?)
There are a lot of people for whom being legally recognized as a couple is the reason they want to be married. They deserve better than to have their happiness and equality threatened by an argument that doesn’t affect them.
This comment was written by Kyra.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 3:23 am
When you say
I fear you assume too much.
This comment was written by Jillian.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 4:32 am
The reason is quite simple — these people are bigots. The arguments they muster are a camoflage so that they can pretend that they have a rational basis for their bigotry. Personally, I find them much more despicable than the Fred Phelps of this world. At least he is honest about his hate.
Shorter Robert: we can’t always get what we want.
Well yes, Robert that’s true; it’s always been true. The whites in the South didn’t think that blacks ought to be able to vote, go to school with them, or use the same bathrooms. I know integration was painful for them but there would be few civil rights if that were all the justiication needed to deny them.
This comment was written by AndiF.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 4:53 am
Thanks Kyra, I was going to bring that up too.
But also, I wanted to critique Amp’s point of social science showing that children do better by being raised ‘by their own mom and dad’ (all other things being equal).
Actually, social science DOESN’T show this. All the research shows that while there are different family forms and some do better than others, those that have a two parent household (regardless of gender) generally have about the same outcomes in parenting.
Of course, and I think you agree with this Amp, demographic trends in variations of parenting abilities or outcomes certainly aren’t used to deny people the ability to parent (unless of course their parenting is that horrific) so no-one could logically argue to apply on the individual level what demographics may show. Going from the general case to the individual case rigidly, universally fails.
Oh, and Robert, I was impressed with your argument. Yes, on the issues on ‘interest’ and ‘happiness’ majority rule should occur. I totally agree, and honestly, with your case for federalism in such a diversely cultural place as the US (yes, the world is officially ending right now *smile*). However, this is not simply about interests or happiness, this is about rights. I know you may disagree with me on this point, but for argument’s sake, let take that it is. Rights have tended to trump majority opinion in this country (although, admittedly, this has more so been the case in the last century or less) and honestly, I think civil rights SHOULD trump the wishes of others. If they want a country where everyone is equal and be proud of such, then they are going to have to take the good shit with the bad shit (from their perspective) that arises therefrom. They can’t have their cake and eat it too (always thought that was a bad metaphor, but I’ll use it here). Moreover, me having the right to marry DOESN’T EFFECT THEM, in any other way than pushing their ‘ick’ factor a few times (and honestly, conservative straight christians having sex is kinda not high on my list of things I want to see, but hey, I’m not going to stop their perverted little boinking *smile*).
But yeah, as Kyra said though, marriage isn’t about children. This trumps it all, especially Elizabeth’s refuted wishes to remain as god-king/queen on the family-form heap.
Oh, and she won’t listen Amp. This isn’t about logic, as we have it on our side, or emotion, which we do too, or similarly humanity. This is about homophobia and bigotry and honestly feeling that you are better than others. That won’t listen to reason.
This comment was written by Sarah in Chicago.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 5:07 am
True, you can’t always get what you want. But if you try sometimes, you just might find, you get what you need. Oh yeah…
This comment was written by noodles.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 6:18 am
Not only is Elizabeth M a heterosexist, she’s also continualy implying that GLBT couples are inferior as parents
The whole “children need mothers and fathers” line is bad statistical manipulation created by Maggie Gallagher, who uses the model of inner city children who grow up with only one parent, and applys that to choldren growing up in same sex households. Because, they’re the same after all. Right?
It’s total bullshit, and she’s never conducted any real studies on children growing up in same sex households because it’s in her best interests not to. Elizabeth will continue to use these bullshit statistics as if they meant something because the battle cry “children need mothers and fathers” is an easy meme that requires no thought before it’s digested by the masses. It’s an effective political slogan, so the truth is irrelevant
The real truth is, we’ve got no real proof that children raised by same sex couples do worse, and some reasonably, but slightly flawed studies that indicate that they do just the same.
The whole ‘protect the children’ argument against SSM is bullshit, and it’s easily disproven.
This comment was written by Josh Jasper.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 6:21 am
This is what I wrote in response to Elizabeth’s post:
But in the US law and religion agreed that marriage is a union of one man and one woman.
Well, the law in the State of Massachusetts says that marriage is a union of two people. But I assume you know this and were just ignoring it. Religion in the US says a vast number of different things about marriage, from “marriage is a union of one man with up to four women”, to “marriage is a union of two people who love each other”. But I assume you know this, too, and were just ignoring it.
If the state says marriage is just between two people that’s a fundamentally different understanding of marriage, one that affirms loud and clear that children do not necessarily need their mother and father.
As you observed in the preceding sentence, the majority of US states (well, you said “US law”) does in fact say “marriage is just between two people”. The only question is whether those two people have to be of different genders or can be of the same gender. So, the “fundamentally different understanding of marriage” is the fundamentally different understanding that you accepted yourself in the first sentence, only to contradict yourself in this sentence. Odd, that.
one that affirms loud and clear that children do not necessarily need their mother and father.
Actually, it does nothing of the kind. Marriage law in the US has never been dependent on whether the two people getting married can have children, let alone whether either or both of them already have children, or either or both of them have a child with another sexual partner after marriage. Literally, never, ever. You are coming from a fundamentally different understanding of marriage law in the US if you think it does. (Religion is another matter. I would not be surprised if some religions in the US do believe that a marriage isn’t a true marriage unless both partners can and do have children.)
But there are aplenty of other laws in the US - and always have been - that affirm loud and clear that children do not necessarily need their mother and father.
You do seem to find yourself fundamentally at odds with the legal system of the US when you make these wild and unsubstantiated claims.
It is a fact that people who want to claim that same-sex couples and their children are not real families, and who do so not by referring directly to bigotry but by trying to set up a definition of what a “real” family is that will exclude all families with same-sex couples parenting children, find themselves with a definition that excludes many, many other families, too. Really, it’s just simpler to say that parents and children make a family. Period.
This comment was written by Jesurgislac.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 6:50 am
That you don’t consider the grounds for their pain to be important doesn’t change its existence.
It does, however, affect whether or not the law should take their pain into account. If someone’s pain is entirely due to their own prejudices and completely unjustified, then no, they are not entitled to have the law cater to that pain. Interracial marriages caused (and in some cases still cause) a hell of a lot of emotional distress to some people. Tough.
This comment was written by Linnet.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 7:23 am
Strictly speaking, I did not make that point at all. In fact, yesterday in the comments on Elizabeth’s blog, I made virtually the same point you made here: Social Science research doesn’t provide any evidence at all that same-sex parents are worse parents.
As I wrote in this post, “I think social science indicates that for most children [own mom and dad is] probably the best way to be raised.” The reason I specified “most” - meaning “not all” - is because I wanted to leave room for the minority of children being raised by same-sex parents, as well as other possible exceptions to the rule.
However, in retrospect, I obviously wasn’t clear enough. Sorry about that.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 7:31 am
oh, I get you now hon, I see where we got kerfuzzled … thanks Amp, and yes, I certainly agree :)
This comment was written by Sarah in Chicago.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 7:34 am
Robert, my tendency is to discount any “purely subjective emotional pain” that people experience as a result of someone else having freedom that doesn’t directly, materially infringe on their own freedom.
For example, it wouldn’t matter to me how much emotional pain it caused a hypothetical group of extreme fundimentalist atheists to know that Christians are free to go to church and worship on Sundays. No amount of athiest pain of that sort, no matter how extreme, would justify taking away freedom of worship from Christians. The athiests in my example will either have to live with their pain or change how they think.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 7:49 am
Robert writes, in a clever and witty comment:
“The day after Amp rubs the lantern and gets a wish and suddenly the legal and social framework in America changes radically, a big chunk of the populace starts buying cabins and subscribing to windpower magazines. ”
Honestly, I really don’t think this is all that likely (and hey, I’m a big fan of people buying cabins and subscibing to windpower magazines, so I would view it as a positive development!). My 2c? The overwhelming majority of these groups would just complain. A small-ish group would choose to demonstrate, etc, as is their right and privilage, another small group would take to the hills, and a very, very few would commit violent acts and hopefully be jailed. Eventually the ones motivated by (understandable) fear of change and honest concern for families would realize that the world had yet to fall apart, while the % of hardcore bigots would probably decrease in each generation.
Things already said above that I wanted to say
The pain being inflicted upon the anti-gay-families folks is the horrible pain of other people getting to do things they shouldn’t think should be allowed, with little or no concrete and material effect on them. The pain being inflicted on the pro-gay-family-folks - especially the ones directly involved - is the pain of being not getting to do things, not getting to enter into certain relationships, etc.
And I want to add my voice to the chorus of - how would your well-stated argument *not* apply to segregation, slavery, feminism, etc? I assume in terms of magnitude?
This comment was written by Dan S..Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 8:16 am
There are a lot of social policies that this somewhat substantial, though by no means majoritarian, bloc of the citizenry simply will not accept.
We have a Bill of Rights in part for just this reason.
Nonacceptance, and social groups deciding to go pout and go home, is not a good argument for tossing out others’ rights or ignoring existing law.
This comment was written by mythago.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 8:19 am
Thanks for this post, Amp. I give Elizabeth the benefit of the doubt on a lot of things because I believe her when she says her positions are not a product of animus, but this whole house-of-cards argument relating to people not getting married because the gays get married and children of lesbians deciding men are irrelevant is just too much. If there was a single shred of evidence to support this parade of horribles, I’d love to see it.
Even if we assumed that young men were so influenced by the gays that they modeled their personal lives and behaviors after them, the parade of horribles assumes there are no other influences available in society to counteract the 1% of marriages involving same-sex couples. Do these kids of lesbians not know any heterosexuals? Do they not watch any tv or pick up any newspapers?
And has the influence of the queers become some omnipresent that young people are unable to evaluate the merits of marriage and having children in the context of heterosexuality. Why is it the gays are able to apply societal messages to their own lives, yet heterosexuals faced with a miniscule number of gay marriages are completely unable to apply societal messages to their lives????????????
This comment was written by Res Ipsa.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 8:42 am
I left a bit out. My reason for bringing in the emotional pain &c of the fundamentalists wasn’t really to say that this pain should trump the civil rights of other citizens, it was to argue against the idea that expanding civil rights wouldn’t be a solution that works for everyone, as Amp was saying. (In the what’s best for most vs. what’s best for all paragraph.) There isn’t a solution that’s best for all, only a choice between scenarios that will provide a “best” for varying groups of “most”.
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 9:00 am
because I believe her when she says her positions are not a product of animus
Well, sure. They could be a product of sexism, or of country-club homophobhia. (She doesn’t think gays are evil, but they certainly oughtn’t to sit up front with the rest of us.)
This comment was written by mythago.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 9:19 am
because I believe her when she says her positions are not a product of animus
Most bigots don’t think they are bigotted. There is something obviously something wrong in those things/people they find objectionable and it’s just amazing that no-one else gets what is so amazingly apparent to them. And/or they will conjure up or find some excessively obscure research to justfy their bigotry: “See? It’s not me! It’s the research that says so!”
(Personally I love the ones that say “civil unions are okay, but marriage isn’t”. So I’m supposed to be happy that they see themselves as not quite a bigotted as the others? Because I should just shut up and be thankful for being thrown the table-scraps?)
Witness anti-feminist men that blame feminists for ‘attacking’ them, or white racists that think that they are being held back by pro-ethnic-minority strategies, or religious fundamentalists who think their religion is being repressed when it’s placed on the same level as any other religion or spirituality. Of course they aren’t bigotted; they’re the victims here, they’re the one’s being hurt!
This comment was written by Sarah in Chicago.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 9:22 am
My sense is Elizabeth is an absolutist who focuses solely on her perceptions of the problems in marriage and for children. It’s a rather noble position and I don’t think she is driven by animus, just absolutism. That doesn’t mean that homophobia doesn’t play a role, just a homophobia plays a role for the views of most people. . . even those posting here.
This comment was written by Res Ipsa.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 9:31 am
“Lack of animus” does not mean lack of bigotry. Where, after all, do those ‘perceptions’ come from? Not from the actual research, that’s for sure. Not from a consistent view of the structure or history of legal marriage.
This comment was written by mythago.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 9:35 am
Unless she is proposing strictures on which heterosexuals can have children and denying marriage to people who don’t choose to have kids, then she is a bigot who is trying to pretend not to be one by cloaking her bigotry behind seemingly reasonable statistical studies. As far the impartiality of statistical studies, it’s rather instructive to see the ones from the early 20th century that showed that Jewish immigrants were more likely to be mental defectives and thus shouldn’t be admitted to the country.
This comment was written by AndiF.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 9:39 am
We can agree to disagree. I don’t believe it is helpful to label everyone who disagrees with me or my positions a bigot because I recognize we are all bigots to some extent pretty much all of our interactions are influenced by some level of bigotry. I think the undercurrent of her parade of horribles is soceital homophobia, but I am not convinced that is primary motivation.
This comment was written by Res Ipsa.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 10:00 am
Actually, Robert, I think legalizing gay marriage, etc. *is* a solution that’s best for everyone. The antis get to relish their pain, sense of alienation, embattled minority status, etc. Otherwise it would be like opening up the newspaper and finding only things you agree with on the op-ed pages. I always need extra coffee when that happens . . .
This comment was written by Dan S..Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 10:25 am
Of course not everybody who disagrees with a position is a bigot but if someone wishes to deny a civil right to a group by applying a standard that is not applied to any other group holding that same right, it’s pretty hard to see it as anything but prejudice.
This comment was written by AndiF.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 10:44 am
I don’t believe it is helpful to label everyone who disagrees with me or my positions a bigot
Elizabeth is not “everyone who disagrees with me or my positions.” I don’t believe it is helpful to soft-pedal people who are motivated by prejudice because, gosh, nobody’s perfect.
This comment was written by mythago.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 10:50 am
Lots of bigots try to park their prejudice in “scientific” observation. Nobody (certainly not a well-educated social scientist) wants to be viewed as spouting irrational nonsense. And protecting “the children” is a time honored noble undertaking that is probably about as safe a place as any to hide one’s bigotry (similar to, I don’t know, rationalizing school and other segregation on the grounds that it protects the virtue of white Southern women). But the fact that Elizabeth has chosen to focus her energies where she has belies protests of not bing bigotted or bearing animus or what have you. Choosing to obsess about the “message” that society sends to “the children” by extending rights to a small group of individuals is almost bizarre in its ability to tune out the maelstrom of cultural and lifestyle forces that have been and still are eroding the stability of all kinds of traditional family supports. Divorce, for instance. Or loss of worker protections. Or the fact that credit card debts now have priority over the payment of child and custody support, thanks to our family friendly president.
I lived in North Carolina for four years, and the KKK, insofar as it was still active, focused on the loss of jobs in the textile industry by whites to blacks, at the same time that thousands upon thousands of these jobs had simply been shipped overseas. As if blacks owned the textile factories. How can you look at what has happened to marriage and family over the last 30 years and think the ascension of gay marriage is going to destroy traditional family structures? That kind of blindness can only be subscribed to irrational fear, whether malicious or just ridiculous (e.g., like children avoiding stepping on the cracks in the sidewalks so monsters don’t get them). At some point, refusing to see something so obvious leads people to the reasonable assumption that yes, you are bigotted.
This comment was written by Barbara.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 10:52 am
Otherwise it would be like opening up the newspaper and finding only things you agree with on the op-ed pages. I always need extra coffee when that happens . . .
Well, I’d hate to take away that boost of adrenaline every morning, Dan. Let’s pass some laws that put gays in camps, that way you can really savor the morning anger.
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 10:53 am
Res Ipsa, to be quite honest after reading your positions on things, I’ve felt you’ve taken a consistent apologist viewpoint for being gay, and overcompensated for others who have layed their cards out on the table. Elizabeth’s motivations as shown by several comments here are definitely politely spoken concepts of bigotry.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 10:56 am
Blargh Edit: Should read - ‘Consistent apologist viewpoint for being gay, and overcompensated for people acting against the interests of gays’
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 10:58 am
What burns me is that there are thousands of parents whose rights should be on the chopping block–they neglect and abuse their kids in every way imaginable. The hit them, have sex with them, refuse to give them any limits, mind-fuck them, refuse to supervise their activities, leave them in cars in public parking lots, and god knows what else. Child protection is an oxymoron. The only headway made in terminating rights was the landmark decision to put a two-year cap on foster care, and that came thanks to Hillary Rodham Clinton.
There is absolutely no known reason a pair of gay parents cannot do as good a job as a pair of heterosexual parents. In many cases, one likes to think they will do a better job.
But children aside, all marriages are civil unions. This is what pro-gay legislators and activists should be saying over and over, rather than pretending that a “civil union” is a fake marriage that maybe people could tolerate.
This comment was written by Diane.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 11:09 am
Kim, I’m sorry you feel I am not the type of homosexual you believe I shuold be, accusing everyone of being a bigot when they haven’t reached the same position I have. Because I am not schooled in labelling everything “misogynistic” or “partiarchial” when they disagree with me, I guess I just have trouble living up to your standards of discourse and thinking. My apologies.
Getting back to the point. I just think we need to be careful about using the “homophobia” card evertime we are in a discussion on this topic. Like screaming “misogyny” or “racist,” pretty soon no one takes you seriously and you become even more marginalized because you can’t carry on a conversation without questioning someone’s values. It’s simpleminded analysis and argumentation.
Do I believe homophobia is guiding most of the anti-SSM rhetoric? Absolutely. Am I willing to label Focus on the Family, the Alliance for Marriage, the Catholic Church, and the Traditional Values Coalition homophic? Absolutely. Am I willing to label Maggie Gallagher homophobic? Absolutely, her record of anti-gay advocacy clearly has earned her that label. But should people like Elizabeth, who has no track record of anti-gay advocacy and appears to be operating in good faith get the label? No.
That’s not to say, however, she should be accountable for her comments and should be wary of allowing her ideas to be co-opted by Evangelicals and those who solely have an anti-gay agenda.
This comment was written by Res Ipsa.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 11:24 am
Res,
It’s not your homosexuality I have a problem with, it’s your just short of ‘ex-gay’ homosexual chastising that I’ve seen occur on other threads. It’s the sort of non-productive and apologetic behavior that seems to be found among some LCR’s and folks like Mary Cheney. While it’s absolutely within bounds for you to act this way, it’s rather silly to not expect to get called on it when you participate in threads that subtly indicate this tendency of yours, but don’t highlight your own ‘track record’ for verbally berating other gay people for fights you don’t think are important (ala gay marriage).
As for Elizabeth, It strikes me as no big surprise that you’re defending a viewpoint that can clearly be shown as extremely narrow and hypocritical.
It’s possible I’m being a bit less charitable towards you than I might ordinarily be, but having read about the ‘ex-gay’ director of the gay reform camp in PA’s thread, I’m rather nervous and leery of homophobia that stems from the well-spring itself. That doesn’t mean I think you ought to be a champion of every gay cause, or even any if that’s not your choice, but at the same time, I don’t think your being gay gives you a free out when you defend opponents of gay marriage, or the fight that is occurring around the idea of gay marriage.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 12:08 pm
Kim, it appears to be my attempts to see all sides and consider other views that you find so baffling. In the future, I will follow the group-think on this: anyone who opposes anything gay is homophobic.
This comment was written by Res Ipsa.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 12:33 pm
I tend to think that it’s pointless to debate whether or not Elizabeth “is” a homophobe.
For me, it’s enough to say that her argument is based on the homophobic idea that it’s acceptable to sacrifice equal rights for same-sex couples and their children when doing so serves heterosexual ends. (Strictly speaking, I guess that’s more a heterocentrist idea than a homophobic idea).
I don’t think that Elizabeth has to be homophobic to make her arguments. The inherant homophobia of her position is not obvious to everyone; I think that Elizabeth’s co-blogger Tom, who favors SSM, might not agree with me that Elizabeth’s position is inherently based on homophobic premises. It’s possible that she’s a non-homophobe, and that in time she’ll come to realize the inherant homophobia of her argument and thus reject her current position. I’d rather give her the benefit of the doubt, just as I’d rather people give me the benefit of the doubt.
In the end, though, it just doesn’t matter to me. Elizabeth is not the important issue here; the wrongness of arguments premised on “homosexuals must do without rights to protect heterosexuals” is.
In addition, as a practical strategy, I really do think focusing on the arugment, rather than focusing on Elizabeth as a person, is more likely to be persuasive for any fence-sitters out there.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 12:42 pm
Thanks for getting us back on track.
This comment was written by Res Ipsa.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 1:29 pm
Ater re-reading Elizabeth’s post, I’m even more sure she’s playing the game of comparing same sex households to single parent households in an attempt to stop same sex marriage.
It’s bullshit, and she ought to know it by now. Same sex couples are *NOT* the same as single parent households, and she’s trying to imply that they are, interms of being bad places (statisticaly) for kids to grow up.
I’m calling her on it We’ll see how she responds.
This comment was written by Josh Jasper.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 3:33 pm
Well, I’m not sure Elizabeth should get the ‘charitable’ view / benefit of the doubt that you afford her Amp. That, however, comes from a person in a family directly affected by her claims.
She’s claiming in effect (as I see it) that somehow children of gays are permanently damaged by having gay parents. Being that my husband’s mother is gay, and married and that due to my husband’s mothers spouse, he has a much BETTER relationship with his mother, I find it - well.. insulting. I also will defend my husband and the amazingly good person he is to the depth and breadth of my being, and as it’s probably quite obvious, if you directly threaten those I love, or myself I’ll come out fighting hard.
I tend to take greater offense at people throwing low blows that they are attempting to cover-up, than those that at least take visible shots that show their attack. If they want to cuddle their homophobia and judgements on a personal level, so be it, but the moment they start publically fighting to hurt my family, well then, we have a problem, and that includes Elizabeth and people defending her sort.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 3:35 pm
I should have added:
The victims of Elizabeth’s argument aren’t just queer’s, they are the families of queer’s and well, that’s a bigger demographic than she might well imagine.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 3:56 pm
I hope this isn’t intended to imply what it sounds like it’s intended to imply.
I’m not sure if that’s what she’s intending to say (although she certainly may be intending to say that - see my criticism of how she cites research). She definitely is saying that children of heterosexuals would be damaged if there were legal SSM.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 3:56 pm
Kim,
I think it’s broader than that because she denigrating both the ‘parents’ and children where the family isn’t based on her normal configuration of mom and dad; and she implies (though perhaps unintentionally) that there is no marriage without children. So she got me twice, once because my sisters and I was raised by what we considered to be two mothers (one of them was my mother, the other was an aunt who lived with us) and again because my husband and I decided to not to have children and apparently had an unmarriage for 33 years.
This comment was written by AndiF.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 4:16 pm
Eh, just because she peppers her anti-gay rhetoric with gentle bigotry doesn’t make it any less bigotry.
So she cushions her views with smiles and half-assed approvals, she still is sending a definitive message: We’re better than you, you’re screwing your kids up.
She also attempts to prove it based off studies that you and I have actually sat down and discussed at length as being extremely questionable and surrounded by all sorts of pitfalls that make the argument far less salient than it might immediately seem. Step-parents are often held at bay from having close parental relationships due to how our culture works. There is often the concern of not stepping on bio-parents toes, and also they often come in amidst a huge amounts of baggage. It’s no complex mathematical equation that tells us, the less baggage, the more successful a familial relationship.
In this attempt to define the perfect type of parents, she absolutely neglects what makes a good parent to begin with. The qualities that make a good parent can be found in both genders and many variations. I’d even make the (unsupported, but gut feeling) claim that I think it’s probable that there are far more unsuitable biological parents living with their children than gay parents living with their children. Contrary to what a lot of people think ‘God says so’ isn’t a legitimate claim of unsuitability, nor is the absence of one set of genitalia.
And as Andi points out, she’s also claiming superiority over any family that isn’t two bio-parents and children. She’s hijacking our families and our marriages to slap up as examples of less than, and then expecting some sort of civil and happy discourse? And people are actually buying into the bs notion that her postulations are somehow ‘academic’ and without animus as prior stated. To me she represents a very dangerous enemy of non-traditional families. The wolf in sheeps clothing.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 5:27 pm
My current favorite spew from anti-marriage equality folks? I’m glad you asked. It is:
“…children do best, on average, being raised by their own mother and father and not just two parents.”
The “on average” kills me. It’s thrown in there to make what they’re saying sound like science. But it isn’t, it’s just a lie. As is the ruse that is their “concern” for the children.
Did you know that children do best, on average, when raised by millionaires? Why aren’t you advocating that only millionaires be able to have and raise children?
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 9:20 pm
As I’ve mentioned before, Elizabeth’s comparisons of same sex couples raising kids to single parent families conctitutes either a direct lie, or staggering ignorance.
The two are not comprable, but she acts as if they were in order to push her agenda.
This comment was written by Josh Jasper.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 9:29 pm
But it isn’t, it’s just a lie. As is the ruse that is their “concern”? for the children.
You know, maybe so. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find that adherents of any ideology or political affiliation were lying about caring about something or someone; it’s one reason I respond a lot more positively to arguments that appeal to my own self-interest than arguments that work from the basis of someone’s alleged deep and abiding concern.
But is there any point to hammering it time after time after time? I can’t think of the last time I’ve read a post on Alas where someone (not always the post author) didn’t chime in with an ad hominem about how the people in question are lying about their concern for children, lying about their concern for the family, lying about their concern for women, lying about their concern for society, lying lying lying. It’s just AMAZING that every single person who has a different policy position than this eclectic bunch of lefties is a huge liar. It’s just ASTONISHING that of all the vast, vast array of people who think that (say) P-A’s ideas are dingo kidneys, none of them really feel the way they say they feel; they’re all liars. You really have to wonder about how all these pathological personalities - who are liars, remember - manage to build these multi-nation and even multi-generation organizational structures. (Why, they must be based on lies, of course!)
Past a certain point, it just diminishes the credibility of the person making the claims. I know that my attention and approval are not the motivating factors for most posters here, but my feelings cannot be unique. And I’ve reached the point that when someone feels compelled to lard every dissent from some other group’s position or statements with accusations of bad faith and lying and puppy-mangling, I just tune it, and them, out. It’s a lot harder to make a case against someone’s ideas than it is to just think of new synonyms for “puppy-mangler”; one of the reasons that I pay attention to folks like Amp is that they rarely resort to accusations of puppy-mangling as a defense of their ideas. I wish there were more people like him.
(Wait, I take that back. I wish that more of the people that I disagree with on everything anyway were like him.)
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 9:43 pm
“It’s just ASTONISHING that of all the vast, vast array of people who think that (say) P-A’s ideas are dingo kidneys, none of them really feel the way they say they feel; they’re all liars.”
Hey Robert, how about making such assumptions about me and my personal agenda on one of my posts. This is Amp’s, so out of respect for his authority, I won’t even get into it here.
This comment was written by Pseudo-Adrienne.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 10:27 pm
This isn’t an ad hominem, though. When someone questions the position of the people making public stands, it is most often done to illuminate biases that they would be unwilling to reveal on their own, and instead attempt to portray their arguments as academic (ie: Elizabeth).
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 11:13 pm
it is most often done to illuminate biases that they would be unwilling to reveal on their own
OK. How does saying “she’s lying about her concern for children”, and not presenting any evidence of dissimulation, just the unsupported slur, illuminate a bias?
The sole informational content being presented is “I assert that this person is a liar.” That’s not useful data, as a general rule. It illuminates nothing.
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
June 17th, 2005 at 11:43 pm
Maybe they are asserting that she’s lying to herself. She’s got this host of ‘facts’ that she knows are easily debunkable, yet she holds to them firmly, despite contrary evidence. She uses irrelevant evidence to back up an argument that not only isn’t helpful to children in gay and lesbian families, but in fact is harmful to them.
Whether the accusation of lying is describing willfull deception of the public or stubborn refusal to accept truths to oneself, a lie is still a lie. It’s also a lie about the topic at hand, used to persuade an audience. Calling someone out on such a thing hardly constitutes ad hominem.
This comment was written by Kim (basement variety!).Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 12:30 am
“…children do best, on average, being raised by their own mother and father and not just two parents.”?
That statement is a lie. That lie is being repeated by people who have been shown the evidence disproving the statement. They continue to repeat the lie. Those people are liars. The fact that they never suggest that other, proven, factors around marriage that harm children (but currently affect only het couples) be changed strongly suggests that their claim of concern for children wrt marriage is a lie.
I don’t claim that those who oppose SSM on religious grounds are liars. I just claim that the US constitution makes their opposition moot. I don’t claim that those who oppose SSM because they believe homosexuals are evil are lying. I just claim that they are bigots.
I hope that cleared things up for you.
This comment was written by Jake Squid.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 5:17 am
Well Robert,
It’s just AMAZING that every single person who has a different policy position than this eclectic bunch of lefties is a huge liar.
That’s a lie. No doubt you are now thrilled to have your point proved. On the other hand if are going to take one statement and make it apply to everyone in a specific group in literally every circumstance, let me borrow that tactic and say that I find it AMAZIN that every single person who has different policy position from you righties is a moral degenerate who has no understanding of the greater spiritual and moral truths.
This comment was written by AndiF.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 5:38 am
Elizabeth M. may be quite sincere in her concern for children. I have no way to judge that and I’m not interested in doing so. That isn’t the issue. The issue is that she has a end — to prevent SSM — and she is willing to take whatever arguments, studies, and statistics she can find and force them to support her position. If she isn’t lying, she is at least being highly disingenuous. In this case, she has taken what may or may not be a genuine concern for children and tried to use it to argue against SSM. If she were sincere that her SSM argument was based entirely on concern for children, then I would expect her to stop spending time on SSM and devote her time to campaigning against people who were abused as children having children since there is overwhelming evidence that abusers tend to be those who were abused.
Errata for post 51:
“if are” should read “if we are”
“AMAZIN” should be “AMAZING”
This comment was written by AndiF.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 5:59 am
amp: I haven’t read the comment thread, this may have been already covered, but just in case it hasn’t…The axiom that children are better off with their biological parents isn’t necessarily always true. Numerous studies on children of lesbian parents has shown that these children do just as well as children raised by heterosexual parents on every measure that anyone can think of. Some of these studies have included very long term follow-up, well into the adult lives of the children. None has shown children of lesbian parents to be in any way worse off than the children of heterosexaul parents. The data on children of gay male parents is similar but the number of studies is much smaller so the conclusion is less definitive. However, again, there is no evidence that a child growing up being raised by gay or lesbian parents is at any disadvantage compared to children being raised by straight parents, even though they are not being raised by both biological parents. I’ll post references to back my claims if anyone asks.
This comment was written by Dianne.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 6:50 am
Dianne: We’ve covered that already, but thank you. I totally agree with you.
AndiF wrote:
I don’t think Elizabeth spends all that much time on SSM. Judging from the work she turns out and what she’s said about her career, she spends far more time researching and writing about the effects of divorce on children.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 7:25 am
Regardless of how much time she spends on it (or how much time anyone else spends on it), using the ‘best interest of the child’ against SSM is a dishonest argument and ought to be abandoned. I really don’t believe that there are any rational arguments against SSM; the only ones that can be taken seriously are those with a religious basis and those only have relevance for religious marriage and can’t be used to argue against civil marriage.
This comment was written by AndiF.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 7:37 am
The thing I don’t get about Elizabeth’s work, and I’ve read a chunk of it (although, probably not as much as others here admittedly) is that she openly, and actively, supports such things as second-parent adoption for SS couples. And not just under a heterosexist framework either. She supports the legal recognition of a ‘mother’ and a ‘mother’ (or vice versa) openly as much (on birth certificates for instance) as being not just respectful humane to the parents, but also best for the children involved.
In fact, for a lot of the things she says, I would call her ally.
But then she does a completely nonsensical 180 to wanting to deny SSM based on ideas of parenting that seem to totally contradict the above support. And not only contradict, but really have no solid basis in reality, as many here have shown, including Amp.
Maybe she is lying, maybe she isn’t. I’m personally willing to give her the benefit of the doubt and say that she might have the best of intentions and she isn’t aware of the strong homophobia of her statements. BUT, particularly if she isn’t aware of the homphobia, this raises LARGE warning flags to me about underlying bigotries and prejudices.
Because if virtually everything else she does is actually good work in being concerned about the welfare of children (such as Amp’s mention of her work on divorce above) and also being supportive of SS couples as parents BUT then on the ONE ISSUE of marriage she runs for the hills, as it were, it tells you there is something else going on here, PARTICULARLY when she backs up her claims for opposition with easily refutable claims and ’studies’.
This suggests to me that there is something special for her in marriage that she beleives should be for heterosexuals only, so much so that she is willing to ignore the massive fallacies in her arguments over such. It is those inconsistencies that speaks to an irrationality that tells me there is a ground level bigotry going on here.
Elizabeth COULD be a really great ally to us. But until she sees her bigotries openly as such (as a lot of us are _trying_ to do similarly in other areas of inequality) and works to correct it, I am going to call a bigot a bigot a bigot, regardless of her intentions.
This comment was written by Sarah in Chicago.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 7:48 am
AndiF wrote:
I agree with you that there are no rational, secular arguments against SSM. I don’t think anyone here would disagree with you about that. Probably that’s why I’ve spent so much time over the past two years engaging with Elizabeth’s views - because I find the opposition to SSM so difficult to understand, and I’m trying to understand it.
I don’t agree with disparaging Elizabeth. On the contrary, I think it’s essential to give the benefit of the doubt to people who are generally pro-queer-rights, but who find marriage equality to be a step too far.
When I debate or argue on the internet, I’m trying to be persuasive, as best as I can, to the person I’m addressing. But even more so, I’m trying to be persuasive to any lurkers reading the exchange who may be fence-sitters on the issue. And it seems to me that fence-sitters on the SSM issue are likely to be people who, like Elizabeth, want to favor equal rights for queers in general, but who have a strong aversion to changing the institution of marriage.
I don’t think suggesting that anyone who holds Elizabeth’s position must be a bad person, a bigot, etc - which is what some of the posters here are clearly implying - is likely to be persuasive to any fence-sitters who are attracted to Elizabeth’s position. On the contrary, I think it’s likely to alienate them. So, from a strategic point of view, it makes sense to give “the benefit of the doubt,” and to concentrate on the argument rather than on the person, whenever possible.
(There are other reasons, too. I think it’s just morally better to be kind to people, by and large. I don’t understand how I can expect anyone who disagrees with me to give me the benefit of the doubt, if I’m not offering it in turn. But the strategic reason alone ought to be enough.)
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 7:49 am
Robert:
Gee Robert, ever hear of Enron? Multi national corporation built on lies. Also see the Unification Church, AKA The Moonies. Multi generation church built on the insane delusion that Sun Myung Moon is the messiah. Literally MILLIONS of people fall for this shit.
Why? Because Barnum was right. There’s a sucker born every minute, and these people are taking advantage of that.
As for Elizabeth, I just SHOWED how she was a liar, so you shifted to attacking my pointing out that she was a liar, instead of addressing anything I actually had to say about her lies. So here you are trying to derail things into a general attack on people you disagree with by hinting that *we’re* the ones making things up.
It’s pretty sad that you’re not up to debating the issues, and are reduced to a slightly more literate “I know you are, but what am I?” retort.
This comment was written by Josh Jasper.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 8:19 am
Amp,
I see your reasons for not calling Eizabeth’s position a bigotry, and certainly think it a definite valid position to take … and hell, treating opposition as reasonable human being is actually a good strategy, something I have tried (admittedly, working on that) to apply in other scenarios.
But I think it is when it is such a personal attack, openly arguing against me and the people I love having the same rights as everyone else, based upon arguments we all agree to not stand up to any real refutation in any way whatsoever, I am going to be less than giving perhaps in my treatment of such a person.
The thing I don’t get about Elizabeth is that IT REALLY MAKES NO SENSE. She does such good work and puts together such excellent arguments in her other work that this is such a glaring inconsistency that to a certain extent it makes it worse. Dumb-arse obvious bigots are easily to laugh at in their stupidity and powerlessness, so it’s almost worse when otherwise perfectly reasonable people argue a similar position based on similarly stupid arguments. Hence my wondering of the basis lying in an irrational bigotry.
I’ll admit, I could certainly be motivated by my own blinkers in this regard, being personally targetted by her accusations, but even given that, and your excellent arguments for doing otherwise, I’m still going to name bigotry bigotry.
This comment was written by Sarah in Chicago.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 8:27 am
Barry:
I agree with you that there are no rational, secular arguments against SSM.
The Hayekian argument is rational and secular. It’s just not enough to convince most people.
Josh:
As for Elizabeth, I just SHOWED how she was a liar, so you shifted to attacking my pointing out that she was a liar, instead of addressing anything I actually had to say about her lies.
I specifically addressed lies about motive, not disagreements about facts and their interpretations. Since I was responding to (and quoting from) Jake’s comment, not one of yours, I’m not sure where you get the idea that I’m shifting my position to avoid your strong point.
This comment was written by Robert.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 8:57 am
Sarah wrote:
If I were to speculate, I would tend to agree with what Res Ispa wrote:
Elizabeth makes no secret of the fact that her parents are divorced, and that her parents’ divorce was an extraordinarily painful thing for her, which has left lasting scars. It’s possible that this has led to the “absolutism” about marriage issues which Res Ispa describes, and to her unwillingness to accept that it’s ever a good idea for marriage as an institution to change. So I agree that there’s a bias there - but the bias is primarily about marriage, not about same-sex couples.
At the same time, I’d never say that homophobia is irrelevant to Elizabeth’s arguments, or to any argument against SSM. Part of what’s going on, I think, is that our society as a whole hasn’t fully absorbed the idea that same-sex couples are just as good, and just as valuable, as cross-sex couples. As a result, arguments that are obviously irrational if we said them about (say) Jews, or blue-eyed people, don’t seem obviously irrational to most people in our society when they’re said about queers.
Most anti-SSM arguments fall into this category. For example, imagine if I said “we can’t allow Jews full marriage rights, because it might be a slippery slope leading to incest.” Put aside the obvious nonsense of the cause and effect claim for a moment - I want to make a different point. Even if it were true that allowing Jews full marriage rights would, in some way, make it easier for people to argue in favor of incest, wouldn’t we still reject the argument because of it’s implication that it’s okay to discriminate against Jews in order to prevent some other social ill?
A century ago, arguing that Jews can’t be afforded full rights, because that would hurt the interests of society, would have sounded like a sensible argument to most Americans. What’s changed in the last hundred years is that society has accepted that Jews are fully human, fully as valuable as anyone else. The idea that it’s ever okay to treat Jews as condoms - that is, to consider Jews something that can be used to provide protection to society from ills - no longer holds water.
That acceptance hasn’t yet happened for queers, however. Which is why arguments that SSM is a slippery slope to incest still carry such currency. I don’t think that SSM will lead to incestuous marriage. But even if I did believe that, it wouldn’t matter - because it’s morally wrong to use queers as human sacrifices to protect society. Queers are people, not condoms; queers are not here to provide protection to everyone else.
But that view is very much a minority view in the USA today. To most people - even if they favor SSM - arugments opposing SSM in order to shield society from a parade of horribles don’t sound obviously irrational. It is the widespread social belief that it’s okay to use queers as condoms that is, I think, the essential backdrop to arguments against SSM.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 9:02 am
children do best, on average, when raised by millionaires
Heh, yes…
I am always amused at how people who claim having a mum and dad in a stable marriage is all that counts to the wellbeing of children. As if it’s a guarantee against psychological neglect, physical abuse, or just ’simple’ heartlessness and cruelty towards the children.
Like it’s all about the external form, not the substance of those relationships. Some real concern for kids, that.
Perhaps there should be a parenting license, after all raising kids is more of a delicate business than driving a car. Then we could see how many straight god-loving folks pass the test.
This comment was written by noodles.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 9:10 am
Robert wrote:
Fair enough. And I think Jonathan Rauch makes a very good argument that the Hayekian argument not only shouldn’t be very convincing, but that it isn’t terribly Hayekian, either.
This comment was written by Ampersand.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 9:53 am
I actually see the logic in Elizabeth’s argument against SSM. If you are a marriage absolutist (much like a pro-choice absolutist) you see every move that can erode an already tenuous situation as the “breaking point” that will put things over the edge. She believes marriage is fragile and vulnerable. Thus, allowing SSM further erodes an already weakened institution because she fears people will be even less interested in the institution if the connection between male/female marriage becomes weakened.
In that sense, she is no different from pro-choice (or pro-gun) asbolutists who are unwilling to accept a single compromise or change because they believe their rights are going to crumble.
Based on her belief that divorce is generally bad for kids (which it is, regardless of what social science you read) and if you believe that non-married relationships are less stable than marriages (again, there isn’t much dispute about this), than you are concerned about fewer people marrying or people not taking marriage seriously.
Now, all of that said, I don’t quite buy the whole asbolutist argument and I feel that it ignores the basic civil rights question that is raised by denying SSM. But there is a logic to it that isn’t necessarily based in homophobia, but instead an absolutist, rationalist belief. You don’t have to agree with it to appreciate there is something there.
This comment was written by Res ipsa.Report this comment to the moderators
June 18th, 2005 at 10:09 am
Res,
You are missing the point slight. Yes, I certainly agree that a part of her argument could come from an absolutist position. However, where the homophobia/bigotry lies is not there, and so we are not arguing against that point.
Where the homophobia lies is in the belief that SSM would WEAKEN the institution of marriage, ie that there is something fundamentally wrong with it such that it would lessen the importance of marriage, making it more tenuous. Why this is homophobia/bigotry is because from precisely the same position, it could be argued that adding SSM to the insitution could STRENGTHEN marriage; both are consitent.
It is the assumption that SSM will intrinsically erode marriage that is the bigotry, particularly because there is no basis for the argument that less people will be interested in marriage (as the article Amp linked to shows, amongst anything - btw, great article Amp! thanks!) if it occurs. Personally. I think it’s going to do niether, unlike some pro-SSM people that think it’ll firm it up, but that’s just my opinion.
Critical thought is in part about looking to the assumptions that underline arguments, and that’s what a lot of us are doing here.
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June 18th, 2005 at 10:15 am
Res Ispa:
“Based on her